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School Cross-Dressing Event Draws Ire
Posted: 2008-04-07 11:30:49
REEDSBURG, Wis. (April 6) - An elementary-school event in which kids were encouraged to dress as members of the opposite gender drew the ire of a Christian radio group, whose angry broadcast prompted outraged calls to the district office.
Students at Pineview Elementary in Reedsburg had been dressing in costume all last week as part of an annual school tradition called Wacky Week. On Friday, students were encouraged to dress either as senior citizens or as members of the opposite sex.
A local resident informed the Voice of Christian Youth America on Friday. The Milwaukee-based radio network responded by interrupting its morning programming for a special broadcast that aired on nine radio stations throughout Wisconsin. The broadcast criticized the dress-up day and accused the district of promoting alternative lifestyles.
"We believe it's the wrong message to send to elementary students," said Jim Schneider, the network's program director. "Our station is one that promotes traditional family values. It concerns us when a school district strikes at the heart and core of the Biblical values. To promote this to elementary-school students is a great error."
Schneider co-hosts "Crosstalk," a nationally syndicated call-in Christian radio show.
After the program aired, both the school and Reedsburg School District office were flooded with calls complaining about the event.
The response surprised Principal Tammy Hayes, who said no one had raised any objections beforehand. She said a flier detailing Wacky Week had been sent home with children the prior week, and an announcement was also included in teacher newsletters.
The dress-up day was not an attempt to promote cross-dressing, homosexuality or alternative gender roles, district administrator Tom Benson said.
"The promotion of transgenderism - that was not our purpose," Benson told the Baraboo News Republic. "Our purpose was to have a Wacky Week, mixing in a bit of silliness with our reading, writing and arithmetic."
The theme for Friday's dress-up day came from students, Hayes said.
"It's different every year. They basically present the ideas, and they vote on what they would like from Monday through Friday," Hayes said. "... They did not mean anything by this day. They were trying to have fun and come up with a fun dress-up day."
About 40 percent of the student body dressed up Friday, Hayes estimated, with half portraying senior citizens and half dressing as the opposite sex.
"I can assure you we will not be having this day (again)," Hayes said.
Reedsburg is in southern Wisconsin, about 60 miles northwest of Madison.
So, here's the Cliff Notes version. A bunch of elementary school kids voted to have a wacky "dress up like an old person or the opposite sex" day a group of religious fanatics got wind of it and shit all over it.
I should clarify here, before I get rolling, that I'm not anti-religion.
I am anti-intolerance.
If you're someone who practices tolerance, patience, love and personal faith, then I am not talking about you.
If you're one of the intolerant fucks that sees something wrong with a bunch of elementary kids dressing up in funny costumes that MAKE YOU uncomfortable because of the fucked-up sexual connotations that YOU are putting on them, then yes, I am talking about you.
Context, kids. It's all about context.
There's nothing wrong with kids playing dress up.
It's not the "Gay Pride Parade" marching through the halls of the school. It's kids dressing up as "old people" and "the opposite sex". Note how the two costumes were lumped together on a single day. Because it's not a day for issues or sexuality for these kids. It's about dressing up like someone other than who you are. It might as well have been, dress up like a cowboy or superhero or Hannah Montana or whatever.
I sincerely doubt that ANY child who suggested or voted for this, did so as a pro-transgender activity day for these kids.
How can you even make that argument?
But the American Taliban aren't interested in context or the subtleties of individual circumstances. They're intolerant. They have their own agenda to force on these kids.
The problem isn't religion. The problem is intolerance and hatred for anything that's different or that doesn't fit in their narrow view of the world, as written in their singular source of information, The Bible.
These nutjobs want to control what media you take in (good luck on that, guys. Information is faster and cheaper today than it ever has been. Ask the Chinese Government how easily they can control internet access in China. Um, not at all.)
They want to control how you dress.
Who you worship and how.
What you say.
Who you sleep with.
And ultimately how this country governs itself. Which has serious ramifications on how we affect the rest of the world. Is there anything less terrifying than a nuclear-armed superpower, commanded by an intolerante religious fanatic that thinks that he's got God on his side anyways, so why not raze the rest of the world in nuclear devastation?
Isn't it tragic to think that a country that was founded on "Freedom from Religious Intolerance" (among other issues) has been so thoroughly hi-jacked by the American Taliban? How far have we fallen away from our Founding Principles?
That tells me that we've lost our way. And that the unshakable faith of the American Taliban has sublimated the will of the rest of the country and we've completely forgotten who we are and what we stand for. Our own lackadasical, un-motivated belief in self and "Separation of Church & State" are all considerably less exciting then when someone feels that they are "donning God's Armor to Do Battle Against Forces That Would Seek To Censor and Control God's Plan For Us All".
We're losing a war that we're not even fighting against people who don't realize that no one is actually fighting them.
They're so bereft of actual targets that they are forced to turn their attention on ever-increasingly obscure offenses. Like kids. Dressing up like old people and opposite gender.
Because it doesn't fit their very narrow view of "traditional family views".
I don't see any difference between the American Taliban and the Taliban of the Middle East. They both use fear and intimidation to further their own, overwhelming urges to control their cultures from within. God's will supplants the will of the people. Everyone is their enemy and everything is a potential attack, so everything has to be censored and controlled.
Someone is definitely in error here but I don't think it's the kids or staff of Pineview Elementary.
Angrily,
Mr.B
Mr.B
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